Smelly Aircon/fan switchover

[Cooket3]

Hi, I have discovered yet another issue with my car. Auris 2.2 d4d 08 reg. 

When I have the air con on everything is fine, however when i switch from air con to the fan, after a few seconds a really bad smell comes from the vents, I'd say it could smell like air con gas but more like smelly feet and vinegar! (This is not from me, my car smells fresh) After I put the blowers on full blast to get rid of it, everything is ok. However, when I switch the air conditioning back on, the same smell appears, and them goes after a minute or so, switch air con off and same happens and same when i put it back on! I have tested this with and without air circulation inside and from outside the car, exactly the same happens.

When I start the car on either fan or air con, there is no smell at all, it is only when I switch from 1 to the other. The smell is constant every time and there is no "Build up", air filter is new too. But if it was the air filter it would smell all the time?

Any ideas?

Thank You

[mickburkesnr]

Over time air con systems tend to become smelly. I've had it in several cars, although it's usually smelly when the air con is on, but the smell is in line with how you described it.

You can buy an air cleaner "bomb" for £2.50 (don't pay any more than £2.50 for it!). All it is is a small aerosol, and you click it on and it'll spray out lots of chemicals. It sits on the passenger footwell of the car with your air con on recirculation. After 10 minutes it should kill the smell.

All instructions will be on the cleaner though.

[haelewyn]

You could also choose to solve the smell by having the aircon system cleaned in some places that works on aircon systems (Midas or other).
Maybe your system hasn't been filled up, refilled, maintained in many years and it could be reasonable to expect that if you have it done now, it will work again for many years without trouble. The smell seems to start from bacteria growing in an aircon system when it is not used.
It is recommended to use the aircon system a few times a month, all year long.

For filling and cleaning the system, we pay around 100 euro around here; Desinfecting and solving the bad smell is around 30-40 euro here.
In a complete maintenance, the gas is filled up, oil is replaced, some product is used to desinfect the system.
Maybe you could consider to replace the pollen filter too. It's the filter that stops particles from coming inside the car through the ventilation.

On my first aircon, more modern than average car (Fiat), my garage didn't know there even was a filter to replace and after about 60.000 miles, my ventilator worked normally but almost no air was coming out of the openings any more.
The filter should be changed, i think, every 20.000 miles in most Toyota's.

[Cooket3]

Thanks for the replies, Ill try the bomb first as its the cheaper option then go with cleaning

[Cooket3]

I used the air com bomb and all seems ok now, thanks